Trendsetters in Information Technology

Community: Co-founded the Tampa
Bay Technology Forum
and is executive director
of the TBTF Foundation,
which funded 25 computer
labs for the Boys
and Girls Club, exposes
youngsters to careers in
math and science, promises
the disadvantaged who
want to pursue science
and math financial support
for college and mentors
them through high school.

The competition: “You always have to be
competing with yourself.”

[Photo: Mark Wemple]

So this is how companies
are named. Tony DiBenedetto
and his co-founders got a
case of beer in 1998, watched
Fletch and went boating on
Tampa Bay. They came up
with about 100 bad names for
their new IT company before
Tribridge emerged as a play
on the bay bridges, the three
of them, a bridge for clients
and so on. Tribridge they
thought was laughable but,
on reflection the next day, it
resonated.

From that provenance,
Tribridge grew, reaching
$65 million in revenue in
2009. The 300-employee
company provides 1,800
customers nationally with IT
services and business consulting.
A hot area: Managed
services, in which customers
pay a fixed fee for Tribridge
to take care of desktop, server
and IT support.

DiBenedetto was raised
by his grandparents in Fort
Lauderdale. After his grandmother
died when he was in
middle school, he lived in 13
different houses, on a friend’s
couch and the like, while
attending Fort Lauderdale
High. “I’ve seen some pretty
crappy things, I guess. I always
viewed it as a learning
experience,” he says.

At Florida State University,
a friend, a confident entrepreneur
type, convinced
DiBenedetto to join him in
starting a Brazilian art import
business. They didn’t do well,
but DiBenedetto caught the
entrepreneur bug. And he
couldn’t shake it during the
11 years he spent at Arthur
Andersen after graduating
from FSU with a degree in
business management information
systems. He started
a truck leasing business on
the side and a restaurant and
bagel shop before launching
Tribridge. His idea of leadership
is drawn from James C. Hunter, author of “The Servant”
— that the CEO is at the
bottom of an inverted pyramid
with the role of removing
obstacles in the way of employees
helping clients.

“To me, you have to create
the attitude of winning,” says
DiBenedetto, 44.

Just What the Doctor Ordered

Albert SantaloCareCloud
CEO, presidentMiami

Family: Father of
four; married to
school teacher
Rebecca Nuñez
Santalo

CareCloud, the newest
startup from Albert Santalo,
42, won ITFlorida’s Small
Business of the Year award
in November — impressive
considering his company’s
first full product release
comes just this month. (It’s
been tested with a few seed clients.)

Born in Baltimore
to Cuban parents who
moved to Miami when he
was 11, Santalo says the
demand is there for his
16-employee company.
“No one’s happy about
how much they collect,
and so we help them
collect more.”